


Stitches

by cenotaphy



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, Coda, Destiel if you squint - Freeform, Episode: s11e02 Form and Void, Everyone Has Issues, Gen, Hurt Castiel, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Rowena's Attack Dog Spell, Season/Series 11 Spoilers, Team Free Will, it wasn't going to be that way originally but those two my goodness, well you don't have to squint that much
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-20
Updated: 2016-07-20
Packaged: 2018-07-25 14:11:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,957
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7535917
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cenotaphy/pseuds/cenotaphy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They break each other down and they put each other back together again. Around and around and around it goes.</p><p>Sort of a long, drawn-out coda to 11x02.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Stitches

Dean had almost forgotten what it was like not to carry the Mark.

For the first time in over a year, he doesn't feel the angry buzzing in his head, the faint yet insistent itch and yearning. For the first time in over a year, he doesn't ache for the warm solidity of the Blade in his hand.

He's free. And yeah, there's the Darkness to deal with, and the woman who had stood before him with her incredibly ancient eyes and told him that she and he were bound, whatever that means. But all that can wait for just a moment, as Dean follows Sam down the stairs into the Bunker, because the Mark is gone.

That cheerful feeling lasts about a minute, until Dean sets his bags down in the war room and turns to see the ruin of their home. The huge pile of books, stray volumes scattered around the edges of the room. There's a bucket and mop in front of the pile now instead of a can of gasoline, and no blood visible on the floor, but Dean remembers the Styne boy, the way his head had snapped around like his spine was a breaking rubber band. He remembers Cas. _Don't think about it_. He doesn't let himself look to his right, at the table that he smashed Cas's face into ( _once, twice, thrice, again_ ).

Sam comes to stand beside him, making some comment about visions, and Dean responds half-heartedly and then gestures at the wreckage and makes a joke about maids and tits, because that's what Dean Winchester does ( _that's all part of your MO, isn't it? Mask the truth_ ), and that's when they hear the sound, a soft rustle like pages turning, coming from behind the unlit pyre of books.

They draw their guns simultaneously, automatically, and Dean begins sidling into the room, Sam falling into position behind his right shoulder. Dean feels a sharp glow of pleasure at how they know how to move together, how they've worked side-by-side for so long that now they react in tandem without the need for words.

Dean glides soundlessly across the bunker floor, keeping his gun trained in front of him. Sam is right beside him as the rear of the book pile comes into view. And simultaneously they lower their guns, because there, behind the pile, bloody and disheveled, is Cas.

And Dean knows the Mark is gone, he _knows_ it, but for a moment he forgets that his forearm is clean and bare, scrubbed clean of evil by a witch's lightning. He's lost in the memory of the last time this happened, the last time he stood and stared down at his beaten friend, and for a moment he forgets that it isn't his hand that has split Cas's cheek open this time. There's blood all over Cas's shirt, the fabric is torn to ribbons, and Dean feels his heart thudding in his chest as he remembers the crunch of Cas's bones, remembers taking hold of Cas's tie and being ready to bring the blade down.

Cas lifts his head.

"Help me." It's barely a whisper, slurred out through cracked lips and a swollen jaw. Dean can't help it—he has to glance at Sam, make sure his brother is seeing this too, make sure this isn't another vision of his sins like the Castiel who had appeared in the motel bathroom mirror. But Sam is staring too, shock and horror written plainly on his face.

Cas looks terrible. In addition to the blood on his shirt, there's more on his face—some leaking down from above his hairline, some trickling from an inches-long cut on one cheek. His eyes are half-closed, his breath coming in shallow gasps.

"Cas, what the hell happened to you?" Sam is already moving, dropping to a crouch beside the angel, reaching out to support his head. "Can you sit? Can you—" Sam grabs at Cas's sleeve with one hand. He shoots Dean an expectant look, but Dean doesn't move. Sam can handle it, and surely _Dean's_ help is the last thing Castiel wants or needs at this juncture.

And more to the point, Dean doesn't get to help. He doesn't get to touch Cas. Not after what he did, not after their fight. If it can even be called a fight—his stomach turns over as he remembers the way Cas had just doubled over and _taken_ the blows, one after another.

"Dean." Sam's voice, impatient, snaps Dean out of his thoughts. "Help me get him up." He's looking daggers at Dean, and his gun may be holstered but his steely gaze is saying very clearly _you take whatever's going on with you and shove it and help me with Cas_.

Dean drops his gun and moves to kneel on the other side of Cas. He puts a hand under Cas's shoulder and another under the angel's arm, and together he and Sam are able to maneuver the angel into a sitting position. The hand that was on Cas's shoulder comes away smeared with blood. Dean tries to crush the shape of his worry into something more manageable.

"Cas, talk to us, buddy," he says, his voice coming out rougher than he intends it. "What happened to you? Why aren't you healing?"

Cas finally opens his eyes all the way, and Dean jerks in shock, taking in the bloody sclera.

"Rowena cast a spell...she compelled me to kill Crowley, but he escaped."

"Okay, forget Crowley for right now," Dean says brusquely. He can't tear his eyes away from Cas's: the burst blood vessels, the dark red pooling around the lovely blue. "Think you can stand? Sam—on three—" He nods to Sam, and the two of them lift Cas to his feet.

The angel sways slightly on the spot. "My grace can't..." He pauses and coughs. "Can't...overcome the spell, in order to heal me at its usual rate."

"What, so it's, like, blocked?"

"More like...consumed."

Over the top of Cas's head, Dean shoots a worried look at Sam. "Okay," he says, trying to process this new information. "Okay. First things first. Let's get you patched up."

"Can you walk?" Sam asks.

Cas's mouth twitches, the dry rasp of his voice carrying a hint of weary amusement. "I walked here, didn't I?"

***

They take Cas into the hall bathroom, which is small but well-lit. There's a small side-table that they had wedged in next to the sink to hold soap and a hand towel. Dean shifts these items unceremoniously on the back of the toilet so that Cas can sit on the edge of the table.

"I'll get the kit," says Sam, and zips out of the room.

Dean takes a step back and surveys Cas. "Alright, coat's gonna have to come off, buddy. Shirt too."

Cas nods and sways alarmingly on the table, causing Dean to jump forward again. "Hey, it's okay, I've got you." He grips the angel's upper arms to hold him up. Cas feels too warm; Dean can see a sheen of sweat gleaming on his friend's forehead, although the temperature in the bathroom is pleasantly cool.

"I apologize," Cas mutters, eyes closed. "My grace, it's keeping the spell at bay, but it's...taking a lot of my strength."

"You're not the one who should be apologizing," Dean blurts under his breath, and then, because he doesn't know what to say after that that, he hastily adds, "Just try to keep from doing a nosedive for a couple minutes, alright?" He lets go of Cas's arms and carefully lifts the trenchcoat over his friend's shoulders. Cas doesn't seem keen on moving much, but he does give a couple of half-hearted shrugs, allowing the coat to slide down his arms.

Dean grimaces. There hadn't been much blood on the trenchcoat, but the shirt is another matter. He dreads seeing the shapes of the wounds he knows he'll find underneath the torn and crimson-soaked fabric.

Cas begins unbuttoning the garment, but he fumbles with the top button for so long that Dean finally sighs and reaches over, batting Cas's hands gently away. "Here, let me," he mutters.

Cas opens his eyes and looks at Dean. His gaze is piercing, unreadable. It's also exhausted and bloody. Dean averts his eyes.

"So, the spell is eating your mojo, huh?" He tries to keep his voice casual. "That mean you're going to end up human again?"

Cas peels his lips back in a bitter smile. "Do not...worry." He pauses to take a breath, then continues, "I believe that if the curse is removed, my...grace will no longer be blocked, and I will be of use to you again."

"Fuck." Dean stops unbuttoning. "That's not what I meant, Cas."

Cas closes his eyes again. "What did you mean?"

 _That I can't deal with everything else that's going on and have you vulnerable, too,_ Dean thinks _._

_That if I'm fucked and Sam's fucked and the whole world is fucked then I need at least one thing, one person, to have a chance of coming out of this okay._

_That you just got your grace back. And if you stay whole, then maybe there can be one person that Sam and I didn't manage to completely screw up_.

 _That I need you to be okay_.

"Just—you just got your grace back, Cas, that's all. I don't want you to get—I don't want you to lose it, because of me and Sam."

And part of Dean wants to say the rest of it, wants to tell Cas what he means to Dean, what he means to both of them. But the sentences stick in his throat, and anyway, Dean Winchester has always been better with actions than words. So he keeps his mouth shut and tries to put what he can't say into his hands, as they undo the buttons on Cas's shirt.

***

Sam finds the first-aid kit in about a minute flat, but after he retrieves it from the drawer he has to stop and lean against the wall for a minute, pressing his forehead against the cool plaster. He closes his eyes but it doesn't help; he still sees Cas's bloodshot ones. The angel had looked so incredibly _weary_. Sam doesn't yet know what happened to him, but he knows it takes a lot for Castiel to look that defeated, and he knows whatever it was, it's because of Sam. Because of Sam's decisions, because of Sam asking Cas to get in harm's way.

 _It should have been me_ , he thinks, half in misery, half in helpless fury. Just like it should have been him in that motel bathroom. But it was Cas, instead. So now it's Cas slumped on their bathroom counter, Cas lying bleeding and exhausted on their floor, and when will other people stop paying for Sam's mistakes?

He wraps his hands more tightly around the first-aid kit and straightens, and heads back to the bathroom. But he stops in the doorway, taking in the sight of his brother undressing an angel of the Lord.

Sam has always moved with light-footed grace, always been able to maneuver his tall frame with agility, and years of hunting have rendered his steps catlike and silent. But he thinks it's not just his own inadvertent stealth that prevents Dean and Cas from noticing him now.

Dean's head is bent, his fingers working at the last few buttons of Cas's dress shirt. Cas's eyes are closed, his head lowered, chin dropped almost to his chest. His arms are half-lifted, fingers actually hooked into the loose cuffs of Dean's sleeves, letting the fabric take the weight of his forearms, as if he had raised his hands to help but ended up lacking the strength. Dean isn't looking at Cas, he's staring down at the buttons, but Sam can see his brother's face in the mirror, and on it is a look of such tender and careful concentration that Sam catches his breath.

He's seen that look on Dean's face before. He's seen it when they interview children during cases, and when Dean fiddles with something under the Impala's hood, and—he forces down the pang in his gut—when Dean would throw an companionable arm around Charlie. He remembers seeing it when Dean lifted Cas's sodden coat out of the river and folded it into a dripping bundle, and he remembers seeing it dozens of times when they were both very young kids and Dean was smoothing a band-aid over Sam's scraped knee, or stroking his hair after a nightmare, or tucking him into bed and telling him that Dad would probably be back by tonight and _definitely_ by tomorrow. It's the look of someone handling something infinitely precious. Cas sits with his head bowed, and Dean bends over the last button, neither of them looking at each other, and the moment is so intensely private that for a second Sam considers just setting down the kit and making a run for it.

The two of them together will be able to fix Cas up faster, though, so Sam reluctantly clears his throat.

Dean jumps about a foot in the air, and takes a guilty half-step back from Cas, whose hands slip from their anchoring points in Dean's cuffs. The angel sways a little, and Sam watches Dean's hand fly up to grip Cas's shoulder, holding him up.

"Um," says Sam. "I brought the stuff." He holds up the kit unnecessarily.

"Uh. Right. Let's get going." Dean runs his free hand through his hair and turns back to Cas. Sam comes over and sets the kit down on top of the toilet as Dean begins carefully peeling off Cas's shirt. It's not an easy task, given the amount of dried and drying blood which is acting as a sealant between cloth and skin, but Dean has always been patient where it counts. He gets the shirt open and makes to slip it off Cas's shoulders, down to his elbows. Sam has begun removing items from the kit, but he looks up when he hears his brother's hiss, and feels the urge to press his forehead into the wall again.

Clothed, Cas had looked badly injured but in an vague way—there was a lot of blood, the source unclear. Now Sam can see the ugly slashes going across his chest, the gouge right over his heart–still weakly oozing blood as Sam looks on, horrified—and what looks like two incredibly deep stab wounds on his right side, one straight through the meat of Cas's pectoral muscle and the other farther down, near his stomach.

"What the fuck, man," mutters Dean, putting both hands on Cas's shoulders and leaning back to survey the injuries. "You shouldn't be _alive_ right now—does this go _through_ —" He cranes his neck to see the mirror, slips one hand down onto Cas's back to feel at his shoulder blade, brings it away sticky and red.

 "My grace is working to keep my wounds from killing me," says Cas slowly. His eyes are still closed; he hasn't opened them since Sam's been in the room. "It's too busy fighting Rowena's curse to heal me completely, but—" He makes a half-hearted gesture with one hand. "As you can see, it has slowed or stopped the bleeding, and the internal damage is somewhat repaired."

"Somewhat repaired?" says Sam incredulously, taking stock of the cuts again. They're going to need more than a first-aid kit for this. "Cas, who did this to you?"

Cas opens his eyes at last, his chapped lips curving, a twisted smile. "My brothers did," he says. "I prayed to my brothers, I asked for aid, and they came and this...this is what I received."

 _Angels_ , Sam thinks, the bottom dropping out of his stomach. Wordlessly, he hands the needle and thread to Dean. Angels had done this to Cas. But of course it was angels, because when was it ever not angels? Cas had suffered more at the hands of his own kin than anyone else. _Except maybe us_.

 _Damn them,_ he thinks, surprising himself with the sudden, uncharacteristic upwelling of vitriol. _Damn them all to hell._

***

Dean has his doubts about the efficacy of stitches for the deep stab wounds in Cas's side, but Cas insists that his grace can handle the internal damage. So Sam carefully cleans the cuts and Dean gets to work with the needle and thread. He goes for the low wound on Cas's abdomen first, crouching awkwardly to reach it. Cas makes no sound as the needle slides in, only a sharp little exhale of breath. His hands are limp on the table.

"So...how did you escape the angels?" says Sam, setting down the soaked gauze and picking up another needle.

"I killed them," says Cas dully. "I killed—and they—" His voice drops to a whisper as he says, almost as if to himself, "There has been so much death among my kind already, and so much of it at my hand."

Dean doesn't want to look up, doesn't want to find in Cas's eyes the pain he can hear in the angel's voice. "S'not your fault," he says. "They were dicks."

Sam kicks him in the foot. "Dean..."

"Don't kick the doctor, Sam. And what? They _are_. You remember Hannah telling Cas to kill me?" Dean's trying to keep his tone light, trying to distract Cas from the pain, but it doesn't seem to be working—Cas makes a soft little punched-out sound and clenches his fists.

" _Dean_ ," says Sam again, crossly. Dean shuts up. His knees are beginning to ache due to his uncomfortable half-crouched position, and he keeps throwing his own shadow over the skin that he's trying to repair.

Sam notices, because Sam notices everything, and Dean hears his brother say gently, "Cas...could you lean back a little?"

Cas complies quietly, leaning back against the wall and shifting his hands to his lap. One sleeve rides up, and Dean sees thin welts circling the wrist, the unmistakable kiss of a handcuff. The angels, he realizes with a sinking sensation, didn't just attack Cas, they captured him.

These aren't battle wounds. They're torture wounds.

Cas moves his hand again and the welts disappear, but Dean's already seen their uneven edges, the overlapping abrasions where the bindings must have scraped and shifted over skin. Cas had fought.

 _Those winged shits are_ damned _lucky they're already dead_ , he think furiously. He wants to keep sewing, but he realizes that his hands are shaking and so he closes his fingers around the needle and waits for it to pass before he touches Cas again, because dammit, he's fucked his friend up enough already without adding crooked stitches to the mix.

Cas moves his hand a third time, the slightest motion, just enough so that he can brush his fingers against Dean's wrist. Dean forces himself to look up, to meet the angel's eyes. _Dean_ , he can almost hear Cas not saying. Nothing more, just the word. There's a world of compassion and trust and reassurance in the dark blue of Cas's eyes. Dean doesn't deserve that. So he forces himself to focus on the red instead, because that _is_ on him.

Cas lowers his gaze, and after a moment Dean does as well, though not before he sees in the mirror that Sam is too-carefully keeping his own eyes fixed on the wound he's stitching.

The new angle makes it easier to see what he's doing, and he finishes with the first cut in a few minutes. The stitches are neat and even, well-done the way John Winchester would have expected work to be done, but the dark thread looks alien and invasive against Cas's skin. The whole wound looks wrong. Which, of course, it is.

***

Dean and Castiel are arguing as the three of them step out into the hallway, but Sam tunes them out, too relieved at having finished the arduous process of stitching up his friend. In the small space of the bathroom, the waves of worry and self-loathing radiating from Dean had felt stifling, and Cas's silent, anxious compassion, as it bounced off the impenetrable wall of Dean's emotional constipation, had been nearly as bad.

"We are not going to lock you up in the basement, Cas!" Dean is saying loudly, as if by raising his voice he can drown out the stubborn resolve in Cas's bloody eyes.

"It's too dangerous," says Cas, sounding more frustrated by the minute. They had decided not to stitch the cut on his cheek, and it's held shut with a white butterfly bandage instead. "Dean, I've told you, I can't control the spell. I won't risk hurting you or Sam."

"You're not going to hurt us," snaps Dean. He comes to a halt, forcing Sam, who is holding Cas's other arm, to stop too. "We're not doing it, alright? End of discussion."

Cas wheels on Dean, jerking his arm free of Sam's grip. "I'm not asking, Dean," he growls. There's a frisson of energy that ripples through the air for a moment as the two of them glare at each other. Sam sighs inwardly and wishes he were elsewhere.

The thought occurs to him that back in the early days, the first year or two that they knew Castiel, there had always been that electric tension between the angel and Dean, as if any room inhabited by the two of them became charged, volatile. And then, gradually, the opposite became true: these days the two of them seem to stabilize when they're together, like ions balancing each other out, planets settling into a familiar orbit. Now, though, there's the same silent crackling of force Sam remembers from those first days, as the hallway vibrates with the lightning of their locked gazes. Dean's hand tightens on Cas's upper arm (Sam notes drily to himself that Cas didn't pull _that_ arm free).

Dean wins this battle, if only because Cas looks like he's losing the will to remain standing. "We're putting you in a bed, Cas," he says. "Quit arguing."

"Then you'll handcuff me to the bedpost," Cas says obstinately, but he drops his gaze and lets Dean lead him down the hallway. Sam follows at a respectable distance of four feet, pausing to nip into the kitchen and grab a pair of handcuffs from a drawer, because of course, being normal people with normal lives, he and Dean keep a spare pair of handcuffs in their kitchen drawer.

Dean and Cas have gone into one of the spare bedrooms. Sam stops in the doorway and sees that Cas is sitting slumped on the edge of the bed, Dean standing in front of him. Dean has one hand on the angel's face, brushing back Cas's bangs. Eyes closed, Cas leans into the touch, seemingly unconsciously. Sam thinks ruefully that he should really start taking longer to fetch things. He clears his throat.

Dean looks up and for the second time that night Sam watches him take a half-step back from Cas. His eyes go immediately to the cuffs dangling off Sam's fingers. "Aw, you've got to be fucking kidding me, Sam—" he says, jaw knotting in fury.

Sam holds up a pacifying hand. "Look, it's a small thing, okay? If Cas feels more comfortable this way, then..." He trails off, looks questioningly at Cas. The angel nods firmly and scoots closer to the head of the bed, lifting one arm in invitation.

Dean backs off a few more steps, folding his arms as Sam crosses the room and bends to close one cuff around Cas's right wrist. As Sam snaps the other cuff around the bedpost, he hears a short, angry exhale from behind him, then the sound of Dean's feet retreating.

"Night, Cas," his brother throws from the doorway, and is gone. Sam meets Castiel's eyes apologetically.

"It's alright, Sam," says Cas, reading Sam effortlessly, as he always has.

Sam shrugs, unsure what to say. "Sorry, Cas." He hesitates, unsure now whether he is apologizing for Dean or for himself. "He's just–I don't know."

Castiel shrugs too, the gesture appearing natural and all-too-human compared to how it would have looked coming from the angel just a few years ago. "He's not comfortable with the idea that I could be dangerous—I understand."

"I don't think that's it," says Sam, but he doesn't know what _it_ is, or if he does know he can't begin to describe it. So he just sighs and repeats, "I'm sorry, Cas," and this time he knows it's for himself.

"Sam. There's no need to apologize," says Cas, his voice warm. _Of course there isn't_ , thinks Sam. _There isn't and there is_. He thinks of all that they owe Cas. Apologies are only the tip of the iceberg.

"I wish Dean would understand that, too," Cas adds, brow furrowed, and Sam has no idea what to say to _that_ , either, so he just musters a pathetic little half-smile and pats Cas on the shoulder. "Night, Cas."

***

He finds Dean in the kitchen, halfway through a bottle of beer, gaze riveted to the top of the table. His brother's face is stormy, and a discussion does not seem promising. Sam gives it a shot anyway.

"What's up with you, man?"

Dean looks up. "Did you see his wrists," he says hoarsely. "Hours, they must have had him cuffed."

"This is different," says Sam, to which Dean snorts. Sam opens his mouth to argue, because he has the reasons lined up already, but everything is crumbling behind Dean's eyes and so he clamps his jaw shut again and takes a seat across from his brother.

"In the bedroom, a moment ago. I was looking at the holes," says Dean after a moment, referring, Sam assumes, to the tiny puncture wounds they'd found in Cas's temples. Cas hadn't seemed to hear when they'd asked him about them.

Sam says, "What about them?"

Dean takes a swig from his bottle. "I think they're from that—helmet thing. That Crowley used on Samandriel."

Sam nods slowly—he had suspected, but hadn't want to think about it. "Fucking angels," he says out loud, over the insistent hissing of _my fault my fault my fault_ in his head.

"Fucking angels," Dean agrees, then lets out a short, humorless laugh. "First me, then those winged dicks. Cas can't seem to catch a break."

"You never hurt him," says Sam quietly, but Dean sets the bottle down and stares at him with something akin to horror.

"He didn't tell you." says Dean, the words coming out slowly, half question, half statement of realization.

"Tell me what?" Sam doesn't think he wants to know the answer, but he watches Dean's knuckles whitening around the bottle and knows that he'll listen anyway, because Dean needs it.

"After I escaped the Stynes, after I..." Dean swallows. "...killed them all, I...Cas and I, we...he tried to stop me, we fought. I fought him."

"He told me that," says Sam, confused. "But he didn't look too badly hurt. He'd already cleaned up the bodies of the two Styne guys." He notes, and files away, Dean's twitch of surprise at the last few words.

"We...yeah. He must have healed himself. I...well, I beat the shit out of him, actually." Dean shows his teeth in a pained smile, just as humorless as the laugh, then takes another drink. It's a careless motion, but Sam can tell by the subtle tensing of his shoulders that his other hand is clenched in his lap.

"Oh," is the only thing Sam can think of to say.

"I almost killed him, Sammy," says Dean softly. He plunks the empty bottle down so hard that Sam half-expects it to break.

Sam thinks of Cas, wounded and hauling away bodies, mopping the floor of the Bunker as his skin knits together. He doesn't know how Dean hurt Cas, and realizes he's picturing the angel as he was wounded tonight. But that was angels.

 _Angels and Winchesters_ , he thinks. _Castiel's deadliest foes_.

"And of course he didn't tell you." Dean rises, kicking back his chair. " _Christ_ , that is so like him."

"Dean," says Sam, giving the shot his best. "I don't think Cas is holding it against you." Dean turns away, hands lifting to run through his hair. Sam continues doggedly. "I don't...that's not how he is. You know that. And...well, it's not like this is the first time he's gotten hurt because of us. I mean, he's—" Sam grimaces— "he's handcuffed to a bedpost right now, because of me. But he doesn't—he always—he forgives us, always."

But Dean's shoulders are already curving beneath the weight of blame, and Sam knows that he won't crack through the hard shell of his brother's guilt, not tonight. Hell, he can barely breathe through his own. He and Dean washed their hands after they tied off the last stitches, but they might as well still have Cas's blood all over their fingers and palms. _I wish you wouldn't, Cas_ , Sam thinks. _I wish you wouldn't forgive us._

"I'm going to bed," mutters Dean, and stalks off. Sam is left to stare at the empty bottle on the table. He listens to Dean's footsteps, counts them off till he knows Dean is outside Cas's half-open door, hears the pause as Dean presumably pokes his head inside to check on Cas. _Go inside_ , thinks Sam. _Talk it out, I swear I won't show up with another first-aid kit_. But after a moment he can hear Dean's steps resume, fading down the hallway.

 

 


End file.
